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by Corinne Manogue

We have often used this activity in faculty-development workshops and TA training to make the point that students have to put many different ideas together to really understand why a given mathematical expression corresponds to a particular physical behavior. It is quite surprising that many graduate students do not see the “plane wave” nature of this activity until the very last step, when they are asked to describe $\cos(\vec k\cdot\rr -\omega t)$. Then, watch the light bulbs go on!!